cooler
04-25-2008, 04:16 PM
Famous Badminton Champ Dies
POSTED: 5:18 pm PDT April 24, 2008
UPDATED: 5:20 pm PDT April 24, 2008
ENCINITAS, Calif. -- Joe Alston, an FBI agent who investigated Patty Hearst's kidnapping and a champion athlete who was the only badminton player ever to make the cover of Sports Illustrated, has died. He was 81.
Joe Alston, who lived in Solana Beach, died April 16 at an Encinitas hospital of complications after cardiac arrest, according to his son, Tony.
Alston learned badminton as a child and went on to win a dozen national titles between 1951 and 1967. He won several mixed-doubles titles with his wife, Lois, herself a top-ranked women's singles player.
He had just won his second U.S. Open singles title when he appeared on the March 7, 1955, cover of the sports magazine. At the time, he had been with the FBI for four years.
"That picture really changed my life," Alston told Sports Illustrated in 1999.
"The bosses said, 'Maybe this isn't the time to have you doing undercover surveillance.' As a result, I continued working investigations -- kidnappings, extortions, bank robberies, all the good stuff -- the rest of my 30 years in the bureau."
Joseph Cameron Alston was born Dec. 20, 1926, in San Diego. He earned a business degree from what is now San Diego State University in 1950 and a year later graduated from the FBI academy. He worked as an agent in Fargo, N.D., and Detroit before he was transferred to the Los Angeles office in 1953.
His fellow agents "were either attorneys or jocks," Alston told the San Diego Union-Tribune in 1993. "From sports, you learn to hang in there on an investigation."
He was the FBI's major case coordinator in Los Angeles from 1967 through 1980. His family said he was involved with investigating the 1974 kidnapping of Hearst, the newspaper heiress who was seized by the radical Symbionese Liberation Army, and in the still-open investigation of airplane hijacker D.B. Cooper.
As a badminton player, Alston represented the U.S. eight times in the world men's team championships. He also was the only U.S. player to win the men's doubles title in the prestigious All England Open Badminton Championships. He and Johnny Heah of Malaysia won in 1957.
His son also was an FBI agent and a leading U.S. badminton player in the 1980s.
In addition to his wife and son, Alston is survived by another son, Nick, of San Diego, and three grandchildren.
Copyright 2008 by The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
POSTED: 5:18 pm PDT April 24, 2008
UPDATED: 5:20 pm PDT April 24, 2008
ENCINITAS, Calif. -- Joe Alston, an FBI agent who investigated Patty Hearst's kidnapping and a champion athlete who was the only badminton player ever to make the cover of Sports Illustrated, has died. He was 81.
Joe Alston, who lived in Solana Beach, died April 16 at an Encinitas hospital of complications after cardiac arrest, according to his son, Tony.
Alston learned badminton as a child and went on to win a dozen national titles between 1951 and 1967. He won several mixed-doubles titles with his wife, Lois, herself a top-ranked women's singles player.
He had just won his second U.S. Open singles title when he appeared on the March 7, 1955, cover of the sports magazine. At the time, he had been with the FBI for four years.
"That picture really changed my life," Alston told Sports Illustrated in 1999.
"The bosses said, 'Maybe this isn't the time to have you doing undercover surveillance.' As a result, I continued working investigations -- kidnappings, extortions, bank robberies, all the good stuff -- the rest of my 30 years in the bureau."
Joseph Cameron Alston was born Dec. 20, 1926, in San Diego. He earned a business degree from what is now San Diego State University in 1950 and a year later graduated from the FBI academy. He worked as an agent in Fargo, N.D., and Detroit before he was transferred to the Los Angeles office in 1953.
His fellow agents "were either attorneys or jocks," Alston told the San Diego Union-Tribune in 1993. "From sports, you learn to hang in there on an investigation."
He was the FBI's major case coordinator in Los Angeles from 1967 through 1980. His family said he was involved with investigating the 1974 kidnapping of Hearst, the newspaper heiress who was seized by the radical Symbionese Liberation Army, and in the still-open investigation of airplane hijacker D.B. Cooper.
As a badminton player, Alston represented the U.S. eight times in the world men's team championships. He also was the only U.S. player to win the men's doubles title in the prestigious All England Open Badminton Championships. He and Johnny Heah of Malaysia won in 1957.
His son also was an FBI agent and a leading U.S. badminton player in the 1980s.
In addition to his wife and son, Alston is survived by another son, Nick, of San Diego, and three grandchildren.
Copyright 2008 by The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.